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Too much fat on your body can lead to serious illnesses such as diabetes, heart attack and stroke. Cardiovascular activities like jogging can help burn fat if you have too much, changing your body composition for the better. Generally, men should have less than 24 percent body fat, while women should have less than 32 percent to avoid health problems.

Jogging and Body Fat

Jogging burns calories, which helps keep your body lean. You store excess calories from food as fat, so the more you burn, the less likely you are to pack on fatty pounds. As the ExRx.net Walk/Run Metabolic Calculator estimates, a 130-pound person burns 269 calories in 30 minutes of jogging at 5 mph, while a 160-pound person burns about 331 calories. At a faster pace of 6 mph, the 130-person burns 316 calories while the 160-pound person burns about 389 calories. For perspective, one pound of fat contains about 3,500 calories.

Fat-Burning Limitations

Although jogging is one of the more efficient exercises for burning calories, it can't melt fat without some help. Burning significant body fat requires creating a calorie deficit, so if you jog to the nearest fast-food joint to pick up a cheeseburger and fries, you may not lose any fat at all -- you could even gain some. To ensure fat loss, pair your jogging routine with a healthy diet that includes reasonable portions of lean, natural foods such as fresh fruits and vegetables, brown rice, seafood and tofu.

Jogging and Muscle

Even without fat loss, jogging can change your body-fat percentage simply by building more muscle. If you don't jog or perform similar exercise now, your leg and hip muscles will grow stronger with the new activity. However, muscle growth will slow as you become accustomed to jogging, and cardio can never build as much muscle as strength-training exercises. To more successfully change your body composition, lift weights or do body-weight exercises such as squats, sit-ups and pull-ups. Perform these two to three times per week in addition to your jogging routine.

Measuring Body Composition

Although your weight offers some indication of body-fat levels, it doesn't precisely reveal your body composition. People with large muscles, for example, may be technically overweight but have very little body fat. Unfortunately, measuring body fat is not always simple. Calipers, or skin-fold tests, are often inaccurate, according to NYU Langone Medical Center. Similarly, bioelectricity sensors, found on some bathroom scales, are subject to error. The only way to get a truly reliable body-composition reading is to see a medical professional.

About the Author

Nina K. is a Los Angeles-based journalist who has been published by USAToday.com, Fitday.com, Healthy Living Magazine, Organic Authority and numerous other print and web publications. She has a philosophy degree from the University of Colorado and a journalism certificate from UCLA.